Eagle

Introduction: Eagle

About: I'm Chandra Sekhar, and I live in India. I am interested in electronics, and building small one-off circuits around tiny chips (the electronic kind).
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My first tottering steps in Eagle, documented before I come to regard them as routine, and cease to think of them as the very high obstacles I had to overcome to get to use it to advantage.

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Step 1: Instal Eagle

Evidently, that Eagle I installed on the desktop is just a pretty picture and does not help design electronic circuits any more than a pitcher of a bush looked at through binoculars (with cap on) will.

The program has to be installed so that clicking on the start button will bring up a menu somewhat like the one below. Clicking on the icon labelled EAGLE 4.13 will start the program. If you have a different version, those digits might be different, of course.

I am sorry, I do not remember any details of installing it. Selecting the default choices offered during installation should be fine, because that is what I usually do.

Step 2: Eagle Control Panel

When Eagle is running, you get a window like this on the desktop. What next?

You see a list down the left edge of the window. Clicking on the + signs to the left of the text label will expand that entry. Click on the + next to the "Projects" line to expand it. I have made a new folder here for my projects, and that examples folder was supplied with the program.

The non-obvious thing is that here you have to right-click to bring up the menu to add items.

I am going to draw a diagram of my oscillator, so I shall add a schematic next.

Step 3: Make a New Project

Right click and select "New Project". A project is a collection of related files on the same subject.

Step 4: Rename New Project

You will get a new empty project which can be renamed to whatever you wish.

Step 5: Renamed to "vhfosc"

The project has been successfully renamed to something descriptive.

Step 6: Make a New Schematic

Select the option to create a new schematic. A new, blank schematic page is created for you.

Step 7: Add Components

Add components to your design. The icon to do it can be found arranged at the left edge of that schematic window.

Make a PCB layout anyway, even if you intend to random wire up the circuit. It will show you the best position to place each component so that the wires make the least tangle - or the most, if you prefer that.

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6 Discussions

If you notice, directly above the right-most SMT pad for the 'bead', there is a via connecting top with bottom. If you don't have any reason for it, you might as well eliminate the via, by ripping up the old route, and re-routing it manually on the top layer. You could also move the SMT device to the bottom of the board, and leave all traces on the bottom. Then you could get away with only using a single-sided board, which is very nice if you are doing your own board production and etching.

True. But my intention was to show a different way of implementing my UHF oscillator, rather than producing a PCB layout for it. The advanced features, like optimising for a single side layout etc are explained in various other instructables at this site.

Darn! I thought I was gonna learn about the care and feeding of haliaeetus leucocephalus. :(
Seriously though, sweet instructable in need of a better title/intro. I'll have to check this software out, now that I know what it is.